Hydrogen and ammonia are becoming increasingly important in the energy landscape, with hydrogen widely pursued for clean energy applications and ammonia emerging as a carrier for hydrogen transport. Both gases present unique challenges for seals, plastics, elastomers, and composite materials used in these systems, requiring thorough qualification and testing to ensure safe and reliable operation.
Hydrogen is very good at permeating and leaking through materials that are impermeable to other gases, and if it escapes, it can contribute to embrittlement and corrosion of nearby metal components. Hydrogen is also very flammable and explosive, which can cause major safety hazards. This makes understanding hydrogen permeation, leakage, and material compatibility critical for systems operating under high-pressure hydrogen service.
Ammonia Transportation
Ammonia is increasingly being used to transport hydrogen efficiently, requiring materials to withstand both its chemical environment and potential hydrogen permeation simultaneously. Ammonia can interact aggressively with certain elastomers and plastics, leading to swelling, degradation, or changes in mechanical properties.
At Alpine, we perform hydrogen and ammonia testing to evaluate:
- Permeation and leakage rates under relevant pressures and temperatures
- Rapid Gas Decompression (RGD) performance in hydrogen and ammonia environments
- Mechanical property retention after exposure, including tensile, compression, and sealability tests
- Dimensional stability and visual inspection post-exposure
- Long-duration aging to simulate realistic service environments for elastomers, plastics, and composites
Testing can be performed across a wide range of temperatures and pressures, including hydrogen and ammonia exposures up to 40,000 psi and over 400°C, using custom and standard test fixtures to evaluate leakage, extrusion, and seal performance. By understanding how materials behave under these demanding conditions, customers can reduce risk in field applications while accelerating development for hydrogen and ammonia service components.
With hydrogen and ammonia playing key roles in the transition to cleaner energy systems, ensuring that your seals, elastomers, plastics, and composites can withstand these environments is critical. Alpine provides structured, reliable testing to generate actionable data for qualification and development of materials in hydrogen and ammonia service